Non-Profit Work

Outside of my research work, I’m grateful to be involved with a non-profit called AAMPLIFY, which is an education and charitable non-profit that empowers underserved Asian Pacific American youth to become social justice leaders. Every year, we host a Social Justice Leadership Program for low-income high school students that aim to pursue careers in law, government, non-profit or social enterprise. Our program includes an intensive summer training and ongoing development with rotations in leadership, social justice and college/career planning. By helping these students recognize their leadership potential and ability to change the world, we give a voice to the needs of our community. I’m happy to be involved in developing the leadership curriculum even though I’m so far away. I’m hoping that giving time and effort can translate to reaching this mission in some way in the not-so-far future.

In addition, I’m involved in a Whitaker International Program Conclusion Grant. A few Whitaker alumni and I won a Whitaker concluding grant of $100k to build a digital ever-lasting storyboard of biomedical engineering lives. This will be centered around Whitaker scholar and fellow experiences throughout the years of the grant. This will involve creating a Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and website that tells stories of the impact of the Whitaker grant, and how biomedical engineers are all over the world changing lives. For more information, see our group, called EverydayBME.